Curufin stood in the middle of the street, and stared at the house numbers.

He could see the one labelled 11 and the one labelled 13, and yet, the house he was looking for - number 12 - was missing. Celegorm was beside him, staring at the trees and the sky and everything around them in awe. Curufin didn't understand his fascination, considering the sky was covered by clouds and the rain hadn't stopped for the past hour that they had been roaming the city.

"Where is house number 12?" Celegorm asked, having finally noticed the inconsistency that Curufin had.

From his memories, Curufin knew that number 12 Grimmauld Place was hidden from the view of the mortals, or muggles, or whatever they were called. Yet, the house should have been visible to him, considering he had the blood of Regulus Black.

"If this infernal rain doesn't stop, a kinslaying will be the least of Russandol's worries," Caranthir grumbled, stomping through the puddles that had formed. His pants were already wet till the knees, and the overcoat he was wearing did nothing to keep the water from falling on his face. His hair, which only fell to his shoulders, was sopping wet and plastered to his skin, which no doubt irritated him more than the rain did. He had lived in Thargelion in Beleriand, and Mount Rerir was known for its snowstorms and unpredictable weather.

"Why are you calling him Russandol now?" Celegorm asked, still peering curiously at the boards that displayed the numbers, even going so far to poke it a couple of times with the stick in his hands.

"Maedhros feels too crummy."

Celegorm levelled the most judgemental look he could at Caranthir. "Crummy. You're calling Maedhros a crummy name. I think I'll tell him about that."

The two started bickering over names and what words were pleasing, and Curufin was tempted to strangle them. It wasn't his nerves acting up, it genuinely wasn't. He also had no idea how Celegorm was walking around with the loose fitting shirt and trousers that he had on, with no overcoat or umbrella. His hair was braided according to the custom of Orome's hunt, which as far as Curufin knew, his brother still didn't have the permission to return to.

"And why are we standing out here in this miserable weather?"

Curufin turned sharply at Caranthir's voice, remembering what he was supposed to be doing, and walked to the other end of the street. Surveying the houses, and the image of number 12 from his memories, he nodded. Without any hesitation, he walked through the gate and stormed across the overgrown plants. There was no path that was visible, but he had never needed visible signs to follow the Song before, and he wouldn't need it now.

"I suppose we should follow him?" Caranthir asked, sounding disgruntled at the thought, although Curufin could hear his footsteps loudly behind him.

Celegorm hummed, sounding for all the world like he was frolicking in a forest clearing. It made Curufin want to strangle his brother, though he knew it was his nerves acting up. He had six brothers, and an unbearable amount of cousins on top of that, he wasn't sure why he was so anxious about this new brother of his. It could be a by-product of his memories seeping into him - Regulus didn't have a good relationship with Sirius - but Curufin disregarded the thought.

"I think we'll leave you here," Celegorm said, stopping right before the first step. Curufin had no idea how he knew where that was, but Celegorm's instincts had saved his life and their brothers lives on multiple occassions. It hadn't saved them in the end, in Doriath, when Dior's Maiarin magic threw off their senses so badly that Celegorm was run through before he had even moved.

"I wouldn't want to go into any house that's built like this," Caranthir added, inclining his head to number 11 and 13. "Besides, I have a family to find as well."

"Are you trying your mansion?" Curufin asked, desperately telling himself that he was not procrastinating. Turning to Celegorm, he asked, "And you, are you going to meet your son?"

Celegorm made a face that was part disgust, part horror, and part desperation. "I'll honor my side of the deal," he said, sounding like he was regretting his choice.

Curufin would have commiserated with him, and it was obvious that Caranthir regretted his idea as well, because he was grimacing.

"Whatever," Curufin said, stepping up when it was obvious his elder brothers wouldn't. "Let's just get this done with."

"Good luck!" Celegorm said, wriggling his fingers at him. Caranthir grunted and rolled his eyes.

Curufin didn't watch as they left, Celegorm's hair bright in the grey landscape of the city. The two of them made a funny picture - cheerful Celegorm and grumpy Caranthir - and as they walked away, Curufin felt the yawning pit of anxiety and panic consume him.

He refused to call them back.

Instead, he turned to the place in front of him where the door would be and walked up the steps.

Upon reaching the door, Curufin pulled out the knife that he had crafted a few weeks ago in the dungeons, and nicked his finger on the blade. Regulus' memories gave him detailed instructions about how blood magic worked, and as long as the house belonged to his family, as long as the base wards remained as Black family magic, Regulus, and as a result Curufin, would be allowed access to the house.

Indeed, when he placed his finger against the door, the blood shimmered and disappeared for a moment, before the house bloomed into place in front of his eyes. Whatever charms had been used to conceal it wouldn't hold against him, although the Fidelius Charm would not allow him to see the occupants of the house unless he was invited to.

The hallway was tiny, and crowded. It was dark and dingy and Curufin liked it immediately. It looked like a place he could set his forge up in and no one would bother him. Even better, it looked like someplace he could carry out his experiments with chemicals, experiments that Feanor had never allowed him to continue in the forges, and that he hadn't been allowed to continue in Beleriand.

He walked through the hall and up the stairs, making his way to his room on the fourth floor, eyes catching the lack of dust and the chips in the banisters that shouldn't have been there, that hadn't been there when he left years ago.

Curufin didn't have the heart to tell the audience he could feel that he knew that he was being watched. But the prickling feeling at the back of his neck did not leave, and it soon became nearly unbearable.

"I can tell that you're watching me," Curufin snapped, feeling jittery. "It would be nice if my esteemed brother would show his face, but I doubt he can do much, considering he's hiding away in this mansion behind a fidelius charm no doubt."

There was no response but he hadn't expected one. The silence haunted his steps as he walked up the floors, his footsteps echoing and the creaking of the floorboards winding up the tension in his body.

Finally, he reached the door that opened to Regulus' room.

For all that they shared a body, Curufin knew that Regulus was a far different person than he was. And Regulus was also dead. There were a lot of things about the boy - for he hadn't grown past 18 years as the human cutoff - that Curufin didn't understand. How could he hate his brother, regardless of the choices he made? Sirius might have been in a different house, might have decided that he didn't want to kill people, might have left Regulus behind. But how could the boy hate him?

It was concerning, the way family here didn't mean the same as Curufin's version of it.

Celebrimbor had repudiated their house, he had disagreed with Curufin's ideologies, his words, his schemes, his lies. And he had decided that he would rather stay with Orodreth, who Curufin personally found to be the most arduous of his cousins to spend time with, than travel with Celegorm or Curufin. Yet, despite their arguments and their disagreements, Celebrimbor had never claimed to hate Curufin, had in fact come to him in the Halls of Mandos when he needed healing after Sauron's torture.

It all came down to the fact that hate against family wasn't something Curufin could comprehend.

Looking at the door, he could see the plaque that looked vaguely familiar still hanging, with dust covering parts of it. He wondered why Regulus had chosen to put a plaque that read, 'Do not enter without the express permission of Regulus Arcturus Black', on the door. He would certainly not have thought of it, but his brothers were much more tolerant of his personal space, excluding Celegorm, Maglor and the Ambarussa.

Shaking his head at the contradiction to his own statement, he pushed open the door impulsively and stalked into the room. It wouldn't do him any good to spend time outside, where the people in the house were watching his every move.

The room was exactly how Regulus had left it in his memories - the bed was made, green covers gathering dust and with holes in places; the curtains were torn; newspaper clippings covered the far wall and the desk in the corner. The photograph of Regulus with his team - the Slytherin Quidditch team in his fifth year - was still placed on the table, the glass clean as the day it had been bought, even though the frame was falling apart.

Beside the photograph was a piece of paper.

Curiosity made Curufin reach for the paper, and he read the words, unsure about the necessity of them. It was certainly not his handwriting, and for all that he was not Regulus, he knew that he hadn't placed the paper here before he had left.

The neat, loopy handwriting read, 'Welcome to Number 12, Grimmauld Place'.

The words seemed to trigger something in his mind, magic reacting a little too violently for it to be entirely normal. Within seconds, the house transformed from the haunting mausoleum he had walked through into a bustling, if still haunting, house. From the open door, he could see the lights flickering down the stairs and when he poked his head out of the room and over the banister, he could see a few people moving around, none of them glancing up at the fourth floor, although they seemed to be tense nonetheless.

Retreating into the room, he shut the door and sat down on the bed.

For some reason, he had been given access to the house, and he wasn't entirely sure what the reason was. Closing his eyes, he placed his head in his hands and went through everything he knew about this world from Regulus's memories. The bits and pieces that had come back to him would do him no good in an argument for his presence here.

It could have been a few minutes later, or hours later, when a knock sounded on his door.

Pulling it open, Curufin wasn't surprised to see Sirius standing in the doorway.

"Regulus?" his brother asked, voice filled with incredulity, hope and an unpleasant resignation. "What are you doing here?"

Curufin shrugged, unsure of his reply. Should he just reveal that he had died, and had returned due to a random child summoning him? Should he reveal that he wasn't Regulus? That he was an elf from before the first age, who had been run through by his victims and had then been imprisoned in the Halls due to his crimes?

"What are you doing outside Azkaban?" he shot back, finally, eras of bickering with Celegorm and Caranthir coming to the forefront of his mind.

Sirius' expression darkened, and he reached for his wand. Curufin didn't move to get his out, even though he knew it was sitting in his pocket.

"You're the death eater of the two of us, brother," Sirius hissed, eyes alight with a kind of fury Curufin found himself matching. "If anything you should be there, with Bella and Cissy and their mad husband, kneeling at the feet of your master."

"I suppose you didn't betray those dratted Potters then," Curufin said, making it sound more like a statement than the question it was. Belatedly, he added, "Traitor to your blood, if not your friends, aren't you?"

Sirius snarled, a wordless sound that no human should be able to produce. But Curufin had lived with Celegorm and Maglor all his life, and the kind of languages they could speak had accustomed him to odd sounds.

"You were no brother of mine," Sirius said.

The shock of the statement made Curufin raise his brows and he let out a slightly hysterical laugh. Even at their worst, none of his brothers had ever excluded him that way. Not once. "And then they wonder why I followed my parents when I was told to join the Dark Lord."

Stalking into the room, he grabbed the photograph on the table and slipped the piece of paper into his sleeve as well. It would be good to have it as blackmail material for later. Sirius didn't seem too shocked that Regulus was alive, or perhaps, in his shock, he was reacting as he would when defensive and pushed to his limit. Both seemed equally likely and though Curufin didn't begrudge him his moods, Sirius would have to learn to care for their family if he wanted to even talk to Curufin.

He refused to allow someone with so little regard for his brother to interact with him.

Not when he valued family so much.

"I think it would be better if I left this place of yours," he said, brushing past Sirius and heading down the stairs. "I'll stay at some inn until I find other accomodations."

In the few seconds it had taken him to gather his belongings, Sirius had gained some sort of awareness of the situation, and his eyes were comically wide, wand nowhere to be seen. Curufin wouldn't forgive him for that anyways. He had never had a problem with holding irrational grudges before, and he didn't have a problem with it now. Besides, at least this was a reason to return to his actual brothers and avoid this new family of his.

"You're supposed to be dead," Sirius whispered, following him down. "I saw it in the news in 1979, when mother publicly mourned you."

Curufin scoffed.

From what he had seen Walburga had cared nought for either of her sons, only wanting an heir. It would have been a stretch to assume that Walburga had mourned her son after his death. Perhaps she had kept up appearances, but she had not cared. Not the way Nerdanel had when the seven of them died. It had affected their mother badly, as they had all seen from the Halls.

"Well, I'm not dead," he shot back, and then walked out of the room without a backwards glance. Stalking down the stairs, he wondered what he was going to do.

He couldn't very well leave yet, what with the time limit that Maglor had placed on them. He could hang around outside for a few more hours and say his brother hated him and disowned him. He wouldn't be wrong.

"Regulus," Sirius said from behind him, strides heavy as he jogged to catch up to him. "Come on, Regulus, where are you going?"

Curufin stuck his nose in the air. "That's none of your business."

Shoving past his sort of brother again, he nearly shuddered.

He wouldn't reveal it to anyone, of course he wouldn't, but he was shaken by the abrupt interaction.

The family he had in this world were odd.

Why couldn't he have a normal family that wouldn't try to kill him? Or force him to join a cult? Or accuse him of actions he may or may not have committed?

Eru, he hated dysfunctional families.

Curufin is difficult to write. If the interactions were stilted, it's because of that.

This happens when the Order is meeting Arthur in St. Mungos and Sirius is alone in the house. The people walking around downstairs in the beginning are Bill, Fred and George, because they're in Grimmauld during that winter break. They haven't told Curufin that they're there, obviously. Kreacher found the note and left it on Regulus' desk (and will make an appearance in further chapters).